Spider Mastermind Encounter

[Zolgia108]

Hi guys, i would like to make a good Spider mastermind boss fight but i've been asking myself how to make it possible.

So i am asking you:

what kind of layout would be the best for it to be good?

what kind of lower tier monster would pair it well?

What kind of weapons are the best to make it challenging enough but not frustrating?

Thanks a lot

[Nevander]

Here's my own suggestions (in my opinion, what I would do):

 

Keep the arena medium sized with an easy to navigate floorspace. Add in cover for the hitscan attacks here and there. Good pairing enemies may be Mancubi, Hell Knights or Barons, preferably out of the boss' line of fire. Good weapons for a balanced fight would be SSG, Rocket Launcher or Plasmagun. Don't put a BFG as a non secret weapon prior unless you want the fight to be a pushover.

[Zolgia108]

7 hours ago, Nevander said:

Here's my own suggestions (in my opinion, what I would do):

 

Keep the arena medium sized with an easy to navigate floorspace. Add in cover for the hitscan attacks here and there. Good pairing enemies may be Mancubi, Hell Knights or Barons, preferably out of the boss' line of fire. Good weapons for a balanced fight would be SSG, Rocket Launcher or Plasmagun. Don't put a BFG as a non secret weapon prior unless you want the fight to be a pushover.

 i noticed on realm that that there is a custom monster, a sort of flying mastermind, what do you think of that? In my wad i am trying to use custom mons and to understand their playability, maybe this would be a nice challenge with some differences, i will probably pair it with mancubus mostly, seems like the better choice. Thanks for being the only one who took the effort to aswer m8 i appreciate it :)

[Pegleg]

9 hours ago, Zolgia108 said:

 i noticed on realm that that there is a custom monster, a sort of flying mastermind, what do you think of that? In my wad i am trying to use custom mons and to understand their playability, maybe this would be a nice challenge with some differences, i will probably pair it with mancubus mostly, seems like the better choice. Thanks for being the only one who took the effort to aswer m8 i appreciate it :)

 

I think Nevander's suggestions are good ones. You also need to consider how much you want the Mastermind to be able to move. You can set up decent suppression fire by setting her up as a turret or you can have her walk around. If you want her to be able to get behind the cover, your arena will have to be large enough to allow for that.

 

Of course, since you're talking about a flying mastermind, that changes things. I've never personally used the flying Mastermind, but given what I know about other flying monsters, this is what I think. You'll need to arrange cover to cover more area. In other words, with a walking SMM, you could provide cover in an arc that covered 180 degrees, and you could set up the fight so that this would be sufficient. However, with a flying SMM, your arena and cover will have to expand to allow for movement that will cover the full 360 degrees, because the fight will move around a lot more.

 

With a regular SMM, you would want to arrange the other monsters to prevent the player from just standing behind cover and occasionally popping out to take a shot. With a flying SMM, you can still use the other monsters that way, but she will prevent you from hiding in one place too long by herself because she can just fly over the obstacle you're hiding behind.

 

Personally, I would use the Mancubus over the Hell knight or Baron, because the fireballs move faster and there's two of them, so they will force the player to move more. Since they don't have a melee attack, if using the mancubus, I would keep them removed some distance away from the player. That would also reduce the chance of them being attacked by the SMM's attack (flying or not). If you really wanted to punish the player for staying in one place for too long, you could use turreted Arch-viles.

[Solmyr]

A Flying Mastermind, an Arachnophyte IIRC, has 500 HP so, it's not good for what you want unless you plan to modify it in Slade, so it can have health equal to the regular Mastermind.

 

Make a medium sized arena with the Mastermind in the center, surround it with sector pillars that automatically move up and down, so they provide temporary cover for the player, and combined with the presence of nearby monsters the player has to constantly stay on the move, interconected trench hallways so the player can retreat to get health and ammo in case things go to hell, a Plasma Gun and Super Shotgun are good for providing a challenge.

 

Pegleg and Neverander's monster suggestions are good, maybe adding Revenants in tall platforms avobe the Mastermind line of sight might also help.

[Memfis]

Don't let any demons get close to it...

[printz]

Here are some suggestions:

1. Use environmental hazards, such as damaging floors or Boom winds.
2. Don't give the player plasma or BFG. Especially, obviously, BFG. They're too powerful for the spiderdemon. Try to make the player exhaust his plasma on other monsters before encountering the spiderdemon.
3. The arena must either have obstacles or a blur artifact. Otherwise it's unfair for the player.
4. Never place melee monsters, especially demons or spectres, in the same walking field as the spider. They can easily turn on the monster, go melee and block it until it dies.
5. Some monsters are actually quite effective as companions. I'm thinking of Mancubi, whose attacks are devastating against players, but pretty weak against a Spiderdemon. They attack rarely and if they anger the spider, they become very easy prey. Imps on higher ground are also quite effective at annoying the player. On the other hand, avoid Arachnotrons — the two Doom 2 maps are proof enough that they make the Spiderdemon encounter too easy.
6. Some weapons are pretty fun to use, such as SSG, as they force the player to go in the open and fire. Despite spiderdemon's size, not all shots connect (unless you use GZDOOM) and if ammo is not so big, you won't want to waste shells.
7. Keep in mind the player has only 100-200 health left, and any mistake of staying in the open is dearly paid. This can make the encounter of a spiderdemon more stressful, because you can't just run away and avoid projectiles, you need to either stay covered, attack it continuously or hope it infights. The latter one is the most common way spiderdemons are neutralized in maps not meant to make spiderdemons real challenges.

 

[elend]

Thanks to everyone in this thread for the very useful and insightful answers. I am also planning a Spider Mastermind as sorr of a set piece and was looking for some tips.